Some quick catch-up, trailer style:
The third interview, in Chicago, was easy, friendly, and fun. Good energy, more about literature than film (the other two had been film-heavy), good variation in points of view and character on the trio of interviewers, good times all around. In a nutshell, then, I did not have anything I considered a bad interview, no awkward questions, no "oh crap they asked THAT," no pressure, even. A lot about me, about my research, about courses I could/would teach/have taught. In a word, exactly as expected. Let's see if I get campus visits, which I should know about in a month.
If you live in the Midwest or parts of the West, check out the Megabus franchise. Cheap tickets to faraway cities.
No students, for the Mysore-style class today, and since I got a big decadent 9 hours of sleep, I went with my partner and we did side by side practices. It was a womderful, really good, Primary. 90 minutes go to stop, all kinds of high, light energy after. For the record, I bruised my right big toe coming out of those Pincha Mayurasana exits (forearm stand exits) to chaturanga yesterday morning, so I guess no more of that until I actually GET that pose in Intermediate, eh?
But jumpbacks in sun salutations were ok, a little sensitive on the foot. Standing poses were big and solid, a little tough in balance in the standing twists, but fine. Balance was A ok in standing hand-to-big-toe, and half-lotuses (standing and seated) were stressless. Jumps back and through were a highlight: many were touchless, and that was pleasant to see return. Even the ones that were scrapy, I could still pick up, rotate, step back or extend through. It was a power/strength practice, not so much a flexibility practice, and it reminded me that I am really strong; it's always fun when the practice "speaks" to you, it shows you yourself in the mirror.
Full exit from Supta Kurmasana, complete with feet still crossed, hit Kukkutasana in one roll up, had one of my deepest Baddha Konasanas ever; feet touching the chin in the second forward bend. Chakrasana is also really coming now; from advice from Maehle's book, I've been pressing up as I roll over, and doing the chaturanga version, not the "high down dog" version, and it is SOME KINDA FUN to just jet back into chaturanga, whoohoo! Three wheels--not 5, not 8--and I let them go; they were big, not too intense, not halfway up, just good old big wheels; I didn't do any hand-walking or anything special, and I felt kinda bad about not "going for it," but I just didn't want to. Enjoy the pose! Press up, down, up, let it go! Now, I'm happy I did that; also, three dropback hangs, able to see the edge of the mat on all counts, but reminding myself, from Arturo's advice not long ago, to keep the dristi on the tip of the nose, not the mat. In 2008 I'll start really thinking drop-back-and-stand-up again.
Headstand with most of the weight in the forearms, and then "upward headstand" with head totally off floor, five breaths. That is TOUGH after a shoulder-intensive practice like Primary. Great lotuses at the end, very mellow in Padmasana itself, fifteen breaths in Uthpluthi, jump back the lotus (and that's coming too!) and then call it a practice. I was super mellow-fied afterwards, and could feel my blood all through my body, could really groove on reality, the present, the moment. THAT, my friends, is apparently why we do this.
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Half of the final day.
One more post from Chicago, and one more interview to go.
The reason I am doing this now is that check-out here is 1 pm, and my second interview is at 1:30 pm. This means that I'll pack up, leave my stuff with the front desk, go to the interview, maybe hit an afternoon session, and then walk or taxi down to my bus; I get back to Indy after 10 pm and probably won't get online until tomorrow.
I have re-discovered, again, but with more conscious awareness this time, that I have a Gonzo streak; yes, I mean Gonzo as in Hunter S. Thompson. Did I tell you that, on the very day he shot himself, I was due to teach the first day of a week of class dedicated to _Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas_ (book and film, adaptation course)?
So, this Gonzo streak. Last night I went down to a hotel bar for a nightcap and wound up talking to an Irishman from northern Indiana, who got into engineering and family and too much whisky. It was a fun conversation, as mildly intoxicated conversations between strangers at the bar often are, but this included two rounds of "hey the conversation's fun, have another" which kept me up until the wee hours of the a.m. (because I know from experience not to sleep on whisky; it tends to bite if you don't tame it first). This wasn't--and I don't think it looks like--some kind of intentional subversion of my morning interview, or a sort of preliminary stress release. The whole encounter, conversation and booze were a sort of "gift," the way you just open up and "receive" what the universe has to offer. And this time, I understood: the universe has FREQUENTLY granted me intoxication, more because I don't refuse it than that I actively want it. True, I want a KIND of intoxication, and I don't confuse booze with yoga; the kind of intoxication I'm pursuing now is consciousness-raising, if you like, and that is ALSO the kind that I pursued before. Blake's "decadence, road, wisdom" thing. When I was in my early 20s, I sought out intoxicants (various and sundry) in the name of decreasing my ignorance and attacking interior voices of morality and "maturity" (not ACTUAL maturity but things like "you need a career" which one might more accurately describe as CAPITALIST maturity); a self-discovery quest, a carving of myself out of the provided wood. And as part of that quest, I consumed a LOT of intoxicants. Back in the day, I could feel my insides craving liquor, on a Wednesday morning. That meant it was time to dry out for a week and then, right back at it. I tried to continue to be able to argue and reason effectively, even blind drunk, and so the quest was to throw the mind as far as it would go, to see what its limits were, to see if there WERE indeed limits.
And from those experiences and that mode of living, I have a Gonzo streak, and the universe knows this. So when I was up most of the night, I had decided that insomnia was a wiser choice than any kind of hangover risk. Sleepless, I can handle; I used to have a night job, and back in college I stayed up for 50-odd hours a few times, just to see what would happen, just to feel time distort, to experience reality off the schedule, heh.
I got a total of 2 hours of sleep, woke up at 5 am, made coffee, rolled out the mat at 5:45 and did the Rocket 2, another crim practice, and on a crim day, even. None of that "crim" business matters, I just like to own it. I'd jumped into all the handstands and done all the arm balances and so forth by 7 am. The sun salutation As were tough, but the utter love for SF kicked in for the B's, that and the joy of moving, the sweat beginning, and then I LANDED both of the forearm stand exits--right into chaturanga, the way you do in Intermediate! Score! I fell out of one of the arm balances and didn't stick the final Mayurasana (which is essentially Locust pose with your elbows in your belly, balancing on your hands) or do any foot-behind-head, but I wanted to practice, and I did, and it rocked.
Then it was breakfast, suit, packing, off to the second of my interviews: 9 am.
I was loaded with nervous energy, but where I could USE it, it really served. I don't think that it was my best self-presentation; I was speaking in a lot of tangents and parentheticals, but when asked a question that I could chew on (such as, what are you going to do with Iranian New Cinema and 1970s film theory?), I reached some of my best formulations EVER of what my work might become (and I even gave myself some ideas for the book!). I'm kind of deranged and scattershot, with pretty roller-coastering energy, from the sleep deprivation, but it's fine. They liked the stuff I do, the potential classes, the research, and hopefully the energy was not too all-over-the-place; that's the one thing I'm anxious about. Great gig: well-endowed liberal arts college, way way loose and fast as to students and majors, seems to have either very low or very efficient bureaucracy and pretty empowered faculty. Good good vibes. I wish in a way that I had re-told the interviewers what a completely "RAWK!" gig they have there, but it probably would have come out in that vocabulary, plus, they know. I mean, I made their interview slate and, this place got my LONGEST cover letter. We know we dig each other; will it "pan out"? Who knows, that's precisely the question on which the next round of stress rides into town.
11 am now; interview #3 (the final one!) in two hours and a bit. Time for some lunch and then to check out. I'll see you suckas tomorrow!
The soundtrack, courtesy of YouTube, by the way, has been:
My Bloody Valentine, "Soon"
Chapterhouse, "Pearl"
Ride, "Vapour Trail"
The Verve, "Bittersweet Symphony"
The reason I am doing this now is that check-out here is 1 pm, and my second interview is at 1:30 pm. This means that I'll pack up, leave my stuff with the front desk, go to the interview, maybe hit an afternoon session, and then walk or taxi down to my bus; I get back to Indy after 10 pm and probably won't get online until tomorrow.
I have re-discovered, again, but with more conscious awareness this time, that I have a Gonzo streak; yes, I mean Gonzo as in Hunter S. Thompson. Did I tell you that, on the very day he shot himself, I was due to teach the first day of a week of class dedicated to _Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas_ (book and film, adaptation course)?
So, this Gonzo streak. Last night I went down to a hotel bar for a nightcap and wound up talking to an Irishman from northern Indiana, who got into engineering and family and too much whisky. It was a fun conversation, as mildly intoxicated conversations between strangers at the bar often are, but this included two rounds of "hey the conversation's fun, have another" which kept me up until the wee hours of the a.m. (because I know from experience not to sleep on whisky; it tends to bite if you don't tame it first). This wasn't--and I don't think it looks like--some kind of intentional subversion of my morning interview, or a sort of preliminary stress release. The whole encounter, conversation and booze were a sort of "gift," the way you just open up and "receive" what the universe has to offer. And this time, I understood: the universe has FREQUENTLY granted me intoxication, more because I don't refuse it than that I actively want it. True, I want a KIND of intoxication, and I don't confuse booze with yoga; the kind of intoxication I'm pursuing now is consciousness-raising, if you like, and that is ALSO the kind that I pursued before. Blake's "decadence, road, wisdom" thing. When I was in my early 20s, I sought out intoxicants (various and sundry) in the name of decreasing my ignorance and attacking interior voices of morality and "maturity" (not ACTUAL maturity but things like "you need a career" which one might more accurately describe as CAPITALIST maturity); a self-discovery quest, a carving of myself out of the provided wood. And as part of that quest, I consumed a LOT of intoxicants. Back in the day, I could feel my insides craving liquor, on a Wednesday morning. That meant it was time to dry out for a week and then, right back at it. I tried to continue to be able to argue and reason effectively, even blind drunk, and so the quest was to throw the mind as far as it would go, to see what its limits were, to see if there WERE indeed limits.
And from those experiences and that mode of living, I have a Gonzo streak, and the universe knows this. So when I was up most of the night, I had decided that insomnia was a wiser choice than any kind of hangover risk. Sleepless, I can handle; I used to have a night job, and back in college I stayed up for 50-odd hours a few times, just to see what would happen, just to feel time distort, to experience reality off the schedule, heh.
I got a total of 2 hours of sleep, woke up at 5 am, made coffee, rolled out the mat at 5:45 and did the Rocket 2, another crim practice, and on a crim day, even. None of that "crim" business matters, I just like to own it. I'd jumped into all the handstands and done all the arm balances and so forth by 7 am. The sun salutation As were tough, but the utter love for SF kicked in for the B's, that and the joy of moving, the sweat beginning, and then I LANDED both of the forearm stand exits--right into chaturanga, the way you do in Intermediate! Score! I fell out of one of the arm balances and didn't stick the final Mayurasana (which is essentially Locust pose with your elbows in your belly, balancing on your hands) or do any foot-behind-head, but I wanted to practice, and I did, and it rocked.
Then it was breakfast, suit, packing, off to the second of my interviews: 9 am.
I was loaded with nervous energy, but where I could USE it, it really served. I don't think that it was my best self-presentation; I was speaking in a lot of tangents and parentheticals, but when asked a question that I could chew on (such as, what are you going to do with Iranian New Cinema and 1970s film theory?), I reached some of my best formulations EVER of what my work might become (and I even gave myself some ideas for the book!). I'm kind of deranged and scattershot, with pretty roller-coastering energy, from the sleep deprivation, but it's fine. They liked the stuff I do, the potential classes, the research, and hopefully the energy was not too all-over-the-place; that's the one thing I'm anxious about. Great gig: well-endowed liberal arts college, way way loose and fast as to students and majors, seems to have either very low or very efficient bureaucracy and pretty empowered faculty. Good good vibes. I wish in a way that I had re-told the interviewers what a completely "RAWK!" gig they have there, but it probably would have come out in that vocabulary, plus, they know. I mean, I made their interview slate and, this place got my LONGEST cover letter. We know we dig each other; will it "pan out"? Who knows, that's precisely the question on which the next round of stress rides into town.
11 am now; interview #3 (the final one!) in two hours and a bit. Time for some lunch and then to check out. I'll see you suckas tomorrow!
The soundtrack, courtesy of YouTube, by the way, has been:
My Bloody Valentine, "Soon"
Chapterhouse, "Pearl"
Ride, "Vapour Trail"
The Verve, "Bittersweet Symphony"
Friday, December 28, 2007
Day two in Chicago...
Hello readers,
Today was easier than yesterday; I'm better when I'm more accustomed to a place, and while I do lack music here for the most part (and currently preferring YouTube videos to radio) while I have it at all times if possible in Indy, I'm adjusting quickly.
Dressing up is not disorienting me in the least; I just act the part and it's nothing, even though I haven't worn a full suit in probably 3 years. I only packed button-down shirts and the like, so at no time do I fully "dress down" unless I'm practicing in naught but these short shorts I brought :) Yeah, no video, sister.
I did a real live old-school practice today, but it was, as they all have been lately, crim. Up at 5:45 am, on the mat at 6:30, full Primary with better jumps than yesterday, a better Kurmasana, a deeper Baddha Konasana, and then Intermediate on top of it, up to Kapo, which KICKED MY BUTT. There is a completely mind-dazzling amount of lumbar bend in that pose, and I'm sure I exaggerate it because my front body isn't open enough for me to take my feet, but YIKES, that pose is intense. When I drop into it and walk my hands in one time, I can swivel my head and see my feet, and I could probably take my toes if I dropped to elbows, but what I want is to press up, to get the front body open, to make the pose HIGHER instead of just LONGER. I'm not certain if that's what it "needs" or not, I really need a teacher to help me get into it, but, as you know, I don't have one.
Anyway, that totally cashed in my wheels; I still did four of them, but they were intense ALL over; the pecs, the quads, the lumbar. It was like Redd Foxx staggering around his place, declaring to Elizabeth that "this is the big one! I'm comin' to join ya!" (come on media slaves, tell me you get it). I dared not take my hands off the floor and walk in, despite feeling flexible enough to do so.
Anyway: from there to breakfast to my morning session, where I read a paper on New Queer Cinema and Brechtian aesthetics (Go Go Google! You know you wanna!). People laughed in the right places (it's a funny paper on a funny film) and I was the final panelist of four, so as my advisor said, I'm "the light, funny paper." And now that's done; Hah, all I have to do is make it a submittable article as soon as possible. No problem, right?
Then sessions, the most recent one on Academic Freedom and how and why David Horowitz is a clever but bad man. Most of the discussion was given to the Right wing's systematic attempt to narrowly define "permissible" discourse, but there were a couple questions about the Left's either clumsy handling of "diversity" rhetoric and/or about the potential for the Left, as well as the Right, to be or become authoritarian. Yes, of course that's possible, but, as one of the panelists said, you don't see an organized, politically-minded, unified Left out there saying, for example, that "Womens studies isn't a discipline, it's ideology" and "Political correctness has a history that goes back to Joseph Stalin" (thank you Mr. Horowitz). So it's interesting to see that the MLA has political concerns, and, in the wider scope, that the Academy has political concerns. I like this perhaps imaginary break out of the "ivory tower."
And now I've called my two interview committees tomorrow and I know where the rooms are; it becomes a matter of waking up at 5, getting on the mat (yes, crim, but you think I'm not practicing before a two-interview day?), getting suited, going to the one at 9 am, getting lunched, going to the second at 1:30. Two small liberal arts colleges. One southern US, one northern Midwest. Then it's "take me to the station" and it's over.
Well, except for potential phone interviews, six more applications, campus visits, and job offers (knock knock on that wood).
Today was easier than yesterday; I'm better when I'm more accustomed to a place, and while I do lack music here for the most part (and currently preferring YouTube videos to radio) while I have it at all times if possible in Indy, I'm adjusting quickly.
Dressing up is not disorienting me in the least; I just act the part and it's nothing, even though I haven't worn a full suit in probably 3 years. I only packed button-down shirts and the like, so at no time do I fully "dress down" unless I'm practicing in naught but these short shorts I brought :) Yeah, no video, sister.
I did a real live old-school practice today, but it was, as they all have been lately, crim. Up at 5:45 am, on the mat at 6:30, full Primary with better jumps than yesterday, a better Kurmasana, a deeper Baddha Konasana, and then Intermediate on top of it, up to Kapo, which KICKED MY BUTT. There is a completely mind-dazzling amount of lumbar bend in that pose, and I'm sure I exaggerate it because my front body isn't open enough for me to take my feet, but YIKES, that pose is intense. When I drop into it and walk my hands in one time, I can swivel my head and see my feet, and I could probably take my toes if I dropped to elbows, but what I want is to press up, to get the front body open, to make the pose HIGHER instead of just LONGER. I'm not certain if that's what it "needs" or not, I really need a teacher to help me get into it, but, as you know, I don't have one.
Anyway, that totally cashed in my wheels; I still did four of them, but they were intense ALL over; the pecs, the quads, the lumbar. It was like Redd Foxx staggering around his place, declaring to Elizabeth that "this is the big one! I'm comin' to join ya!" (come on media slaves, tell me you get it). I dared not take my hands off the floor and walk in, despite feeling flexible enough to do so.
Anyway: from there to breakfast to my morning session, where I read a paper on New Queer Cinema and Brechtian aesthetics (Go Go Google! You know you wanna!). People laughed in the right places (it's a funny paper on a funny film) and I was the final panelist of four, so as my advisor said, I'm "the light, funny paper." And now that's done; Hah, all I have to do is make it a submittable article as soon as possible. No problem, right?
Then sessions, the most recent one on Academic Freedom and how and why David Horowitz is a clever but bad man. Most of the discussion was given to the Right wing's systematic attempt to narrowly define "permissible" discourse, but there were a couple questions about the Left's either clumsy handling of "diversity" rhetoric and/or about the potential for the Left, as well as the Right, to be or become authoritarian. Yes, of course that's possible, but, as one of the panelists said, you don't see an organized, politically-minded, unified Left out there saying, for example, that "Womens studies isn't a discipline, it's ideology" and "Political correctness has a history that goes back to Joseph Stalin" (thank you Mr. Horowitz). So it's interesting to see that the MLA has political concerns, and, in the wider scope, that the Academy has political concerns. I like this perhaps imaginary break out of the "ivory tower."
And now I've called my two interview committees tomorrow and I know where the rooms are; it becomes a matter of waking up at 5, getting on the mat (yes, crim, but you think I'm not practicing before a two-interview day?), getting suited, going to the one at 9 am, getting lunched, going to the second at 1:30. Two small liberal arts colleges. One southern US, one northern Midwest. Then it's "take me to the station" and it's over.
Well, except for potential phone interviews, six more applications, campus visits, and job offers (knock knock on that wood).
Thursday, December 27, 2007
It is ON, my friends, oh yes, it is.
I write to you from Chicago! I am downtown, esconced in a big fancy hotel with exaggerated prices for everything, and alluring luxuries in every direction. But, I still clean up nicely, and I mean, NICELY, fully suited, and despite the ponytail! Hah! We've won again! Up this morning at 7, partner driving me up at 8, getting into the hotel at 11, beginning a primary practice at about 11:45, sketchy jumpbacks, hamstring soreness, nonetheless a really solid standing series, intentionally unbound Mari D's (to work the spine-straight, abductors-engaged twist), six rounds of the boat (Navasana), too little room to extend fully in the tortoise (Kurmasana), shoulder pain in the wheel, so did three rounds of Bridge instead. A good, mellow closing series, but a lot of stress about the 4 pm interview. Big, expensive lunch, return to room, suited, out, to the neighboring hotel, interview.
Conversational, friendly, all about my recent work and what I'm able to teach, very good energy. A real conversation, the kind you want interviews to be but never prepare for, because if you prepare for that, you get the "tell us about your worst experience in a classroom" variety. Very good times. Compliments to my interviewers, you guys rocked and were very good fun, and enthusiastic about ideas (is there ANYTHING cooler than being enthusiastic about ideas?).
Then a trip to a session called "Pleasure Now!" and a discussion of pleasure in/as part of cultural critique (it was fun, there was overt laughter). And then to the hotel bar (yes, booze and I remain friendly; if you ever acquired a taste for single malt scotch, you'd have a hard time putting it down TOO). And then back here to wage an hour's war with the internet connection, which, as you see, now works.
Tomorrow morning, a paper presentation. Then a day of sessions, or movies, or whatever I deem fit. Saturday morning, interview #2. Saturday afternoon, interview #3. Saturday late afternoon, Union Station for a bus. Saturday night, arrival in Indy. Sunday afternoon, Mysore-style class.
Which reminds me: a certain teacher of mine from SF is going to be in the Midwest in August 2008 and emailed me to ask about workshops there. What a sendoff, if I'm trekking out to a new gig just after that! Rawr!
Conversational, friendly, all about my recent work and what I'm able to teach, very good energy. A real conversation, the kind you want interviews to be but never prepare for, because if you prepare for that, you get the "tell us about your worst experience in a classroom" variety. Very good times. Compliments to my interviewers, you guys rocked and were very good fun, and enthusiastic about ideas (is there ANYTHING cooler than being enthusiastic about ideas?).
Then a trip to a session called "Pleasure Now!" and a discussion of pleasure in/as part of cultural critique (it was fun, there was overt laughter). And then to the hotel bar (yes, booze and I remain friendly; if you ever acquired a taste for single malt scotch, you'd have a hard time putting it down TOO). And then back here to wage an hour's war with the internet connection, which, as you see, now works.
Tomorrow morning, a paper presentation. Then a day of sessions, or movies, or whatever I deem fit. Saturday morning, interview #2. Saturday afternoon, interview #3. Saturday late afternoon, Union Station for a bus. Saturday night, arrival in Indy. Sunday afternoon, Mysore-style class.
Which reminds me: a certain teacher of mine from SF is going to be in the Midwest in August 2008 and emailed me to ask about workshops there. What a sendoff, if I'm trekking out to a new gig just after that! Rawr!
Monday, December 24, 2007
What, is there a holiday approaching?
Criminality continued yesterday with a nice most-of-Primary, solo, in a studio room, with, yes, the full moon on. "Take rest," it says, on moon days. REST? Hah! Double hahaha! With all respect to the tradition, which I really do dig, it's better for my entire bodymind to practice than it is to pretend that stressing while seated in front of this machine is "rest." So there, I was crim. We are suprised by this. It was a nice little practice, I really liked it.
Today is Christmas Eve, and it's sunny and blue-skied outside, which I adore. The volume of my upcoming life events goes like this: conference in 3 days quite totally outplays holiday tomorrow. Tomorrow I will chill, hang, open the few presents which have arrived, catch some easy narrative cinema (theater or home, doesn't matter) and intentionally not design syllabi or anything like that. Take rest. I will give it my BEST SHOT and see how it goes. Practice? If I do, tomorrow, it'll be "before the day," meaning that I'll wake up crazy early, get it out of the way and gone, and then "have the holiday."
Then it's pack, plan, get all paperwork assembled, take care with all the new and fancy clothing recently purchased, get ready for 4:00 pm interview, right off the bat, once I get up there on Thursday. Paper to present, Friday morning. Saturday morning interview, Saturday afternoon interview, Saturday night bus. Sunday afternoon Mysore class to teach in Indy, and I'll be here to do it.
Practice EVERY DAY up there. I have ideas about this, but I'll post more about them depending on how and if they happen. Yes, it's still crim to practice on a Saturday; do you SERIOUSLY think I'm not going to do at least a pack of sun salutations before a 9 am interview? Haha!
Today was my first in-the-house practice since probably November; for all I can recall, maybe longer than that. Most of Primary, up to Supta Kurmasana, which made me feel like I'd been punched in the solar plexus, and then a quick dip into Intermediate, up to Bhekasana (four poses in) and then backbends (2 bridges, trio of wheels, down, two more wheels). I had more energy than I needed in Sun Salutation B and had to chill it out, with knees down in Down Dog (!!). Forward bends of all stripes were fine, twists were intense (outer hips, stressholders central). Jumps back were scrapy, maybe due to practicing at 60 degrees, or due to being covered in, effectively, sweats. I did also get a pouring sweat on, which rocked. Jumps through were largely fine, a little scraping, a few smooth ones. I'm getting into Lotus more and more easily these days; a year ago it took mondo concentration and intent, as Garbha Pindasana developed. Maybe to practice for Karandavasana someday, I'll just practice doing-and-undoing Lotus, 10 or more times a day.
And now, to get into holiday gear. Happy ones to ya!
Today is Christmas Eve, and it's sunny and blue-skied outside, which I adore. The volume of my upcoming life events goes like this: conference in 3 days quite totally outplays holiday tomorrow. Tomorrow I will chill, hang, open the few presents which have arrived, catch some easy narrative cinema (theater or home, doesn't matter) and intentionally not design syllabi or anything like that. Take rest. I will give it my BEST SHOT and see how it goes. Practice? If I do, tomorrow, it'll be "before the day," meaning that I'll wake up crazy early, get it out of the way and gone, and then "have the holiday."
Then it's pack, plan, get all paperwork assembled, take care with all the new and fancy clothing recently purchased, get ready for 4:00 pm interview, right off the bat, once I get up there on Thursday. Paper to present, Friday morning. Saturday morning interview, Saturday afternoon interview, Saturday night bus. Sunday afternoon Mysore class to teach in Indy, and I'll be here to do it.
Practice EVERY DAY up there. I have ideas about this, but I'll post more about them depending on how and if they happen. Yes, it's still crim to practice on a Saturday; do you SERIOUSLY think I'm not going to do at least a pack of sun salutations before a 9 am interview? Haha!
Today was my first in-the-house practice since probably November; for all I can recall, maybe longer than that. Most of Primary, up to Supta Kurmasana, which made me feel like I'd been punched in the solar plexus, and then a quick dip into Intermediate, up to Bhekasana (four poses in) and then backbends (2 bridges, trio of wheels, down, two more wheels). I had more energy than I needed in Sun Salutation B and had to chill it out, with knees down in Down Dog (!!). Forward bends of all stripes were fine, twists were intense (outer hips, stressholders central). Jumps back were scrapy, maybe due to practicing at 60 degrees, or due to being covered in, effectively, sweats. I did also get a pouring sweat on, which rocked. Jumps through were largely fine, a little scraping, a few smooth ones. I'm getting into Lotus more and more easily these days; a year ago it took mondo concentration and intent, as Garbha Pindasana developed. Maybe to practice for Karandavasana someday, I'll just practice doing-and-undoing Lotus, 10 or more times a day.
And now, to get into holiday gear. Happy ones to ya!
Saturday, December 22, 2007
The Good, the Bad, and the Crim.
When I was writing a dissertation, my roommate at the time, this guy from New Zealand, gave me a CD copy of the soundtrack from one of the greatest spaghetti westerns ever made by human hands. I am far from solitary in my admiration of this film, but of course I have thoughts on this: in gender terms, I think that boys like archetypal heroes in sparse landscape. One could probably break that down by socioeconomics and even by American mythologies (frontier, anyone?) but all the way back to early westerns and all the way up to Taxi Driver and V for Vendetta, we like our solitary heroes; even better if they're morally ambiguous. Why is Die Hard a franchise? The Matrix, too? Hmmm...
Anyway: I've said that when pressed for time, I practice on Saturdays. Well today was a led class, and I sure as heck wasn't about to miss it. Crim? What crim? Stretch or don't, purge some of that stress held in my outer hips, or not? Hah! Choice made, no contest.
Ten people of various exposures to Ashtanga. I did, essentially, a Mysore practice, with "take it up asana" between sides of seated poses, to save time. I got to Baddha Konasana before needing to cut a pose, and that's in part because I did my Karandavasana prep once I reached Garbha Pindasana; here's how that goes:
I do Garbha (make lotus, hands through, put em on your head, roll to-and-fro 9 times, land on your hands, balance, Kukkutasana). From there, because I can't make Lotus without my hands, I put my hands in front of my lotus and "suck it up" to Urdhva Kukkutasana C (yes, that's in Advanced A, and yes, that's crim, yes, I'm perfectly clear on that). From there, I lower my head into a tripod headstand position and extend the lotus upward, and then downward, and then pop up, into Urdhva Kukkutasana A (yes, still crim, so noted). While I'm in the tripod formation, I lower and raise the lotus a few times. This is my prep for the Intermediate pose; so to be clear, I do an Advanced pose, to a slightly less Advanced pose, SO THAT I can prep my Intermediate pose. Hilarious. Fun, though.
I can already do Pincha Mayurasana (forearm stand) just about whenever I want, so I figure that lotus-lowering-and-raising is the next prep for Karandavasana; anyone want to put in two cents here? Haha, yes, I know I should work on my Kapo before going anywhere near Karanda (which sounds like "Caramba!" as long as we're listening to a spaghetti western soundtrack--"We don' need no stinking badges!" or words to that effect).
8 backbends total; 2 to get used to it, a trio, then another trio. Quick closing series (10 breaths inverted, 5 breaths all elsewhere) and call it a practice. Not TOO much lameness from the left shin/foot--some, but nothing that would really make me want to stop practicing. I took care of it and didn't flex the foot unless it was absolutely necessary.
Less than a week now, and the three interviews and one paper will be over, and I'll have a week of "vacation" (hah! Hahahahaha!) before classes begin; I'll have to put two syllabi together and get an article up and running for my advisor.
Ah me! Ah life!
Anyway: I've said that when pressed for time, I practice on Saturdays. Well today was a led class, and I sure as heck wasn't about to miss it. Crim? What crim? Stretch or don't, purge some of that stress held in my outer hips, or not? Hah! Choice made, no contest.
Ten people of various exposures to Ashtanga. I did, essentially, a Mysore practice, with "take it up asana" between sides of seated poses, to save time. I got to Baddha Konasana before needing to cut a pose, and that's in part because I did my Karandavasana prep once I reached Garbha Pindasana; here's how that goes:
I do Garbha (make lotus, hands through, put em on your head, roll to-and-fro 9 times, land on your hands, balance, Kukkutasana). From there, because I can't make Lotus without my hands, I put my hands in front of my lotus and "suck it up" to Urdhva Kukkutasana C (yes, that's in Advanced A, and yes, that's crim, yes, I'm perfectly clear on that). From there, I lower my head into a tripod headstand position and extend the lotus upward, and then downward, and then pop up, into Urdhva Kukkutasana A (yes, still crim, so noted). While I'm in the tripod formation, I lower and raise the lotus a few times. This is my prep for the Intermediate pose; so to be clear, I do an Advanced pose, to a slightly less Advanced pose, SO THAT I can prep my Intermediate pose. Hilarious. Fun, though.
I can already do Pincha Mayurasana (forearm stand) just about whenever I want, so I figure that lotus-lowering-and-raising is the next prep for Karandavasana; anyone want to put in two cents here? Haha, yes, I know I should work on my Kapo before going anywhere near Karanda (which sounds like "Caramba!" as long as we're listening to a spaghetti western soundtrack--"We don' need no stinking badges!" or words to that effect).
8 backbends total; 2 to get used to it, a trio, then another trio. Quick closing series (10 breaths inverted, 5 breaths all elsewhere) and call it a practice. Not TOO much lameness from the left shin/foot--some, but nothing that would really make me want to stop practicing. I took care of it and didn't flex the foot unless it was absolutely necessary.
Less than a week now, and the three interviews and one paper will be over, and I'll have a week of "vacation" (hah! Hahahahaha!) before classes begin; I'll have to put two syllabi together and get an article up and running for my advisor.
Ah me! Ah life!
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
World's quickest set of trailers.
Just like movie previews:
The lame foot has me sometimes thinking of neurological disorders, and it's probably not one, but it's productive to really confront disability/mortality (some neurological disorders are progressively fatal; paralysis with full consciousness, that sort of thing), so practice for the coming week is likely to be inversions and seated meditation.
Vinyasa class this evening was fun: my right calf is beginning to touch down, almost up to the back of the knee, in front splits.
Conference: 3 interviews, one paper presentation, one new suit purchased so that I look as mature as the earning of a PhD says I am. The ponytail, however, stays. In 10 days it's on; in 13, it's over.
For about the last week, ten days maybe, I've had the WEIRDEST sort of disembodied feeling, like I'm underwater, like I'm receding from all of reality; it's like a massive fevery cold coming on, like something out of a 19th century novel. Maybe The Dark is Rising?
The lame foot has me sometimes thinking of neurological disorders, and it's probably not one, but it's productive to really confront disability/mortality (some neurological disorders are progressively fatal; paralysis with full consciousness, that sort of thing), so practice for the coming week is likely to be inversions and seated meditation.
Vinyasa class this evening was fun: my right calf is beginning to touch down, almost up to the back of the knee, in front splits.
Conference: 3 interviews, one paper presentation, one new suit purchased so that I look as mature as the earning of a PhD says I am. The ponytail, however, stays. In 10 days it's on; in 13, it's over.
For about the last week, ten days maybe, I've had the WEIRDEST sort of disembodied feeling, like I'm underwater, like I'm receding from all of reality; it's like a massive fevery cold coming on, like something out of a 19th century novel. Maybe The Dark is Rising?
Thoughts on clothing-optional yoga, for a blogger I often read.
Let's say you see a posting online for some studio or other outfit that has a clothing-optional yoga class (I figure calling it this, will cut down the number of Google searches that wind up here).
There is, to my thinking, a flowchart of reactions which might occur:
1) You're interested, to a varying degree, or not.
2) If not, maybe your disinterest is fairly visceral: YUCK! Maybe you know where your disinterest comes from (introspection reveals), or maybe you don't. Maybe you get curious about the source of your distaste for this sort of thing (privacy? suspicion that it's all a big dirty hippie party? body image? anxiety about consent? anxiety about being gazed at/being the gazer at? anxiety about orientation/gender/something else? bad/good past experiences? memories you'd sooner not relive? something else? a combination?) and maybe you don't.
3) Beyond sheer body politics (if you're aware enough to realize that your interest, disinterest or revulsion is always in part body politics, because this is about bodies, and that's always political), maybe you read the site's rhetoric (if it posts any) and you have further reactions to that.
For example: is this a yoga class, maybe specifically for one gender, and the rhetoric is about honesty and leaving your defensive ego self behind? That's one thing. Is it more about sexual energy and creating/opening a community of honesty, even to the point perhaps of intimacy workshops and even physical contact between members (of the community, you pervs)? That probably generates or partakes in a different reaction.
4) Body-mind, when it's clothing optional. We live in a fairly sex-negative and body-anxious culture. Check out how we treat the sick and the old in America sometime. We're body anxious. Check out how we valorize the sexual power of youth and further how we link that sexual power to a capitalistic buying power, but also to the necessity of cleaning, polishing, making "perfect," the body. Need more than your television to see this? Have a look at books by Susan Bordo, Laura Kipnis and Riki Anne Wilchins, for starters. Have a look at Todd Haynes' film _Superstar_. Research eating disorders. Men get them too.
What are we to do then, with clothing-optional yoga? Clothing-optional, as I've said, means body politics, body image, and, at least in rhetoric, it's also linked to orientation. Heterosexual unclothed yoga? That just BEGS some lasciviousness, right? After all, they make porn movies out of some of those positions, right? Sure they do. BUT, yoga is all about overcoming that sort of thing, isn't it? OR IS IT? Leave the ego behind? But my eyes, what do I do with my eyes? Can I control my reactions? Do I want to? Is that what this is for? Is it about more control or loosening control? Increasing the border guard or decreasing the border guard? Do you believe that "human nature" is animalistic and that, therefore, loosening your guard is actually dangerous, perhaps to yourself or others? Somewhat like drinking too much at the bar and hitting on that attractive person? What, wasn't that very behavior VALORIZED when you were in college? Did you partake then? Were the politics different, the BODY politics, the SOCIAL politics, the RELATIONSHIP politics? What, relationshipping HAS politics? Oh, maybe you should have checked out the contentious reactions to Kipnis' book in 2003. Young people, at least in the spectacle of reality television, get more "freedom" and less "responsibility" in their spectacular relationshipping. But older, more "mature" people, "have to" settle into "mature" relationships and that so often means monogamy and so forth (but, but, wait, my ID! I've seen _American Beauty_ one too many times!). See how complicated it is? And how "yoga" is of course connected to some Jungian collective-mind sixties vibe, and how obviously if you take your clothes off in a yoga class, it's going to devolve into Woodstock, just with less acid? Or DO YOU want to drink the Kool Aid????
5) Suddenly we're talking about what human nature is and belief systems about the function of the body in terms of metaphysics. Maybe we should turn the heat down and get to some practicals:
6) In any institution worth its salt, no one will touch you without permission in a clothing-optional context. Are you comfortable being touched/adjusted in a so-called "normal" yoga class? How do you react? Have you ever been uncomfortably touched/adjusted in that context? How did you react? How would you react? Those rules still apply. Note, for the record, that "normal," above, probably implies that "yoga class" isn't a sexual context, or one with body politics, but it is. A whole separate rant could be inserted here.
7) Just like they told you in college: no means no. This rule always works unless you are around people who are determined to break it. If you find yourself in that context, politeness no longer needs to be maintained. You are entitled to defend yourself. Be secure in indulging, be secure in refusing. It really is that simple; it's the BEING SECURE that isn't. Remember, when you walk into a situation with ramped-up body politics: it'll test your security in your skin. Much revulsion directed at situations with ramped-up body politics (or even DISCOURSES about them, like those in Kipnis) comes from people who don't want to confront something about their own body politics.
8) Saying yes. What do I cite here? Carol Queen? The Ethical Slut? David Schnarch's work on marriage? The policies of "Safe Sane and Consensual"? Or, for those feeling a bit more risque, the policies of "Risk Aware Consensual Kink"? Or is that going too far? If you're going to transform your bodymind in a sex-negative culture, and you're going to do that by going to a clothing-optional yoga class in a place that does a lot of sexually-based "liberation" sort of stuff, you want these ideas in your head.
What, they disinclude "outsiders"? You want to sound "insider" in such a community? Walk in the front door and be able to confidently, and from the interior, owning the words, ask them, "Is your Orgasmic Meditation program done under the rubric of safe, sane and consensual?" You'll sound as insider as it gets. But you need to own the words, and have seen the videos, and read the books, to do that. While you're at it, and if you can stand flourescent pink and some downright transgressively comic imagery and a big ole 60s' vibe, rent Annie Sprinkle's video _Sluts and Goddesses Workshop_. That'll give you an idea of how insider you want to be.
Bodymind; it's not two words, and it never was. That's why long-term yoga practice transforms your habits and your belief systems. Sexuality has been, like everything that can be marketed (what, you think markets all involve money? Hah!), privatized to ourselves, and of course, that also isn't true. But to creep out from under this rock and begin to "go public" with being what maybe not since ancient Greece has REALLY been citizenship, means owning and setting YES and NO. OWNING them, not deriving them from some stale moral code that you didn't invent. SELF POSSESSION is the key to moving your limits; if you don't know your limits or you didn't set them yourself, you can't very well pick them up.
9) Experience. What shall we say about this? What kind of experiences does one NEED in order to partake of a clothing-optional yoga class? Well, on one hand, none. What do you need, a body, clothes, and a few bucks to pay for the class? Great, mix ingredients, stir, move about for an hour, go. Done!
BUT what kind of experience does one need to CLEAR THE VISION of such an experience? Ahhh, now we're in some chewy territory. For the record, clear vision doesn't mean the ability to partake in any activity, no matter how far out. Clear vision means being able to see, own, accept and live by, ones own standards of yes and no. Maybe no is set real close. Great. Do you own it there, want it there, did you put it there yourself? Fabulous. What'd you do, hit some unclothed finger-painting party up in the attic, in college? And get over-involved with that person with whom you'd shared so much energy over the semester? Oops! Well, at least that'll make a great story someday! Hang out with the other seniors, before graduation, baring it all in the name of honesty and transgression? Trying to disempower the American equation whereby skin equals arousal? Did it work? Did you know what the rules of the game were; did you change them? Or were you just diving into that pool to get the privatized "credit"? Are you more _American Beauty_ or more _Shortbus_? Measure your emotions and write them down: jealousy? fear? more? layered reactions? Contradictions? I'd expect so.
Once upon a time there was a guy with both a wife and an external partner; a real live working trio, but not a triangle. He also, in the past, had related to another person in the same trio format (before his current external-to-marriage partner). One day this prior relatee and her then partner went to visit this guy, his wife, and his current partner, and the four of them (guy, partner, his former relatee and her then partner) spent a morning talking about the various insecurities shared between them, as to whether or not this guy and his former relatee would do any sexual relating during this trip. It took four hours for this to be figured out, and the figuring meant that insecurities and desires (for things to happen and for things not to happen) had to be related. Much honesty and self-knowledge and, eventually, acceptance, was involved. Not all parties were satisfied, but all parties were accepting of the final terms.
This sort of thing, for my money, is much more productive for "being able" to attend a clothing optional yoga class, than exposure to actual public unclothed people would be. This conversation and relationship formation was all about consent, and not about experience (well, eventually it set some guidelines and rules for experience, but the conversation itself was about consent). Consent requires intense and constant self-knowledge. Rock on, Socrates. Experience, which does not explicitly require consent (rohypnol, anyone?), is perhaps useful, but can leave scars (what yoga could call samskaras, seeds). Consent is, as I see it in yoga terms, about negotiating the rules regarding experience, to reduce the impact of samskaras. To not create more bad energy than there already is.
And we end with BKS Iyengar: one does not end darkness with a hammer, but with a lantern.
There. Rant over.
There is, to my thinking, a flowchart of reactions which might occur:
1) You're interested, to a varying degree, or not.
2) If not, maybe your disinterest is fairly visceral: YUCK! Maybe you know where your disinterest comes from (introspection reveals), or maybe you don't. Maybe you get curious about the source of your distaste for this sort of thing (privacy? suspicion that it's all a big dirty hippie party? body image? anxiety about consent? anxiety about being gazed at/being the gazer at? anxiety about orientation/gender/something else? bad/good past experiences? memories you'd sooner not relive? something else? a combination?) and maybe you don't.
3) Beyond sheer body politics (if you're aware enough to realize that your interest, disinterest or revulsion is always in part body politics, because this is about bodies, and that's always political), maybe you read the site's rhetoric (if it posts any) and you have further reactions to that.
For example: is this a yoga class, maybe specifically for one gender, and the rhetoric is about honesty and leaving your defensive ego self behind? That's one thing. Is it more about sexual energy and creating/opening a community of honesty, even to the point perhaps of intimacy workshops and even physical contact between members (of the community, you pervs)? That probably generates or partakes in a different reaction.
4) Body-mind, when it's clothing optional. We live in a fairly sex-negative and body-anxious culture. Check out how we treat the sick and the old in America sometime. We're body anxious. Check out how we valorize the sexual power of youth and further how we link that sexual power to a capitalistic buying power, but also to the necessity of cleaning, polishing, making "perfect," the body. Need more than your television to see this? Have a look at books by Susan Bordo, Laura Kipnis and Riki Anne Wilchins, for starters. Have a look at Todd Haynes' film _Superstar_. Research eating disorders. Men get them too.
What are we to do then, with clothing-optional yoga? Clothing-optional, as I've said, means body politics, body image, and, at least in rhetoric, it's also linked to orientation. Heterosexual unclothed yoga? That just BEGS some lasciviousness, right? After all, they make porn movies out of some of those positions, right? Sure they do. BUT, yoga is all about overcoming that sort of thing, isn't it? OR IS IT? Leave the ego behind? But my eyes, what do I do with my eyes? Can I control my reactions? Do I want to? Is that what this is for? Is it about more control or loosening control? Increasing the border guard or decreasing the border guard? Do you believe that "human nature" is animalistic and that, therefore, loosening your guard is actually dangerous, perhaps to yourself or others? Somewhat like drinking too much at the bar and hitting on that attractive person? What, wasn't that very behavior VALORIZED when you were in college? Did you partake then? Were the politics different, the BODY politics, the SOCIAL politics, the RELATIONSHIP politics? What, relationshipping HAS politics? Oh, maybe you should have checked out the contentious reactions to Kipnis' book in 2003. Young people, at least in the spectacle of reality television, get more "freedom" and less "responsibility" in their spectacular relationshipping. But older, more "mature" people, "have to" settle into "mature" relationships and that so often means monogamy and so forth (but, but, wait, my ID! I've seen _American Beauty_ one too many times!). See how complicated it is? And how "yoga" is of course connected to some Jungian collective-mind sixties vibe, and how obviously if you take your clothes off in a yoga class, it's going to devolve into Woodstock, just with less acid? Or DO YOU want to drink the Kool Aid????
5) Suddenly we're talking about what human nature is and belief systems about the function of the body in terms of metaphysics. Maybe we should turn the heat down and get to some practicals:
6) In any institution worth its salt, no one will touch you without permission in a clothing-optional context. Are you comfortable being touched/adjusted in a so-called "normal" yoga class? How do you react? Have you ever been uncomfortably touched/adjusted in that context? How did you react? How would you react? Those rules still apply. Note, for the record, that "normal," above, probably implies that "yoga class" isn't a sexual context, or one with body politics, but it is. A whole separate rant could be inserted here.
7) Just like they told you in college: no means no. This rule always works unless you are around people who are determined to break it. If you find yourself in that context, politeness no longer needs to be maintained. You are entitled to defend yourself. Be secure in indulging, be secure in refusing. It really is that simple; it's the BEING SECURE that isn't. Remember, when you walk into a situation with ramped-up body politics: it'll test your security in your skin. Much revulsion directed at situations with ramped-up body politics (or even DISCOURSES about them, like those in Kipnis) comes from people who don't want to confront something about their own body politics.
8) Saying yes. What do I cite here? Carol Queen? The Ethical Slut? David Schnarch's work on marriage? The policies of "Safe Sane and Consensual"? Or, for those feeling a bit more risque, the policies of "Risk Aware Consensual Kink"? Or is that going too far? If you're going to transform your bodymind in a sex-negative culture, and you're going to do that by going to a clothing-optional yoga class in a place that does a lot of sexually-based "liberation" sort of stuff, you want these ideas in your head.
What, they disinclude "outsiders"? You want to sound "insider" in such a community? Walk in the front door and be able to confidently, and from the interior, owning the words, ask them, "Is your Orgasmic Meditation program done under the rubric of safe, sane and consensual?" You'll sound as insider as it gets. But you need to own the words, and have seen the videos, and read the books, to do that. While you're at it, and if you can stand flourescent pink and some downright transgressively comic imagery and a big ole 60s' vibe, rent Annie Sprinkle's video _Sluts and Goddesses Workshop_. That'll give you an idea of how insider you want to be.
Bodymind; it's not two words, and it never was. That's why long-term yoga practice transforms your habits and your belief systems. Sexuality has been, like everything that can be marketed (what, you think markets all involve money? Hah!), privatized to ourselves, and of course, that also isn't true. But to creep out from under this rock and begin to "go public" with being what maybe not since ancient Greece has REALLY been citizenship, means owning and setting YES and NO. OWNING them, not deriving them from some stale moral code that you didn't invent. SELF POSSESSION is the key to moving your limits; if you don't know your limits or you didn't set them yourself, you can't very well pick them up.
9) Experience. What shall we say about this? What kind of experiences does one NEED in order to partake of a clothing-optional yoga class? Well, on one hand, none. What do you need, a body, clothes, and a few bucks to pay for the class? Great, mix ingredients, stir, move about for an hour, go. Done!
BUT what kind of experience does one need to CLEAR THE VISION of such an experience? Ahhh, now we're in some chewy territory. For the record, clear vision doesn't mean the ability to partake in any activity, no matter how far out. Clear vision means being able to see, own, accept and live by, ones own standards of yes and no. Maybe no is set real close. Great. Do you own it there, want it there, did you put it there yourself? Fabulous. What'd you do, hit some unclothed finger-painting party up in the attic, in college? And get over-involved with that person with whom you'd shared so much energy over the semester? Oops! Well, at least that'll make a great story someday! Hang out with the other seniors, before graduation, baring it all in the name of honesty and transgression? Trying to disempower the American equation whereby skin equals arousal? Did it work? Did you know what the rules of the game were; did you change them? Or were you just diving into that pool to get the privatized "credit"? Are you more _American Beauty_ or more _Shortbus_? Measure your emotions and write them down: jealousy? fear? more? layered reactions? Contradictions? I'd expect so.
Once upon a time there was a guy with both a wife and an external partner; a real live working trio, but not a triangle. He also, in the past, had related to another person in the same trio format (before his current external-to-marriage partner). One day this prior relatee and her then partner went to visit this guy, his wife, and his current partner, and the four of them (guy, partner, his former relatee and her then partner) spent a morning talking about the various insecurities shared between them, as to whether or not this guy and his former relatee would do any sexual relating during this trip. It took four hours for this to be figured out, and the figuring meant that insecurities and desires (for things to happen and for things not to happen) had to be related. Much honesty and self-knowledge and, eventually, acceptance, was involved. Not all parties were satisfied, but all parties were accepting of the final terms.
This sort of thing, for my money, is much more productive for "being able" to attend a clothing optional yoga class, than exposure to actual public unclothed people would be. This conversation and relationship formation was all about consent, and not about experience (well, eventually it set some guidelines and rules for experience, but the conversation itself was about consent). Consent requires intense and constant self-knowledge. Rock on, Socrates. Experience, which does not explicitly require consent (rohypnol, anyone?), is perhaps useful, but can leave scars (what yoga could call samskaras, seeds). Consent is, as I see it in yoga terms, about negotiating the rules regarding experience, to reduce the impact of samskaras. To not create more bad energy than there already is.
And we end with BKS Iyengar: one does not end darkness with a hammer, but with a lantern.
There. Rant over.
Monday, December 17, 2007
This just won't stay on topic.
It's mid-December. Last week I noticed a sort of "numbness" on the outside top of my left foot, which permits the foot to pronate pretty deeply unless I put conscious energy there, telling it not to. This is not unfamiliar. Back when I was running around tracks in high school, this used to happen, and I chalked it up to stress about performance, about whether or not I'd win/place, etc. In ashtanga practice, it makes rotating the foot (say, as you turn from triangle toward revolved triangle) really difficult; sometimes the foot will just "flop" over, and I also feel this sort of energetic dis-engagement, or break, in updog to downdog.
But I doubt that it's some kind of sly nerve damage. Yet I wonder, wait a minute, I haven't had this regularly since I was EIGHTEEN, and that's real close to TWENTY YEARS AGO. So what gives? Performance anxiety revisited? The coming conference, the coming interviews? Is that possible? Well, let's see what this conference potentially is:
December 27-30, Chicago. Thousands of liberal arts graduate students, faculty and others. A massive, MASSIVE number of schools will interview candidates here. As of today, I will be interviewed three times (and likely more will be requested between now and then). These will be for tenure-track gigs (so far), which means, positions that are, perhaps, permanent. None of them are any closer than about 4 hours from here by car, and some are several days drive from here. A word about my current mode of living:
My partner and I live in a house here in Indy. We are both East Coast kids, both PhD's, both lefties, both veggies, both arty hippie types, both West Coast kids by soul's intention (she is at home in Seattle; I, as you probably know a thousand times by now, at a city more south than that, by a famous Bay named after it).
What are we to do when (knock knock on the wood) I get employed somewhere, say, 6 hours drive from here, or 4 hours by plane from here, or elseway far, far away? She is in a tenure-track gig, I am in a one-year visiting gig (and it runs out in May 2008). Do we do long distance for a year and then SEE about me re-jumping into the job market, or both of us doing it? Or does she leave the fourth or fifth year of a tenure-track gig (it takes six years before you get tenure, BUT if you don't get it, you basically leave the Academy, as I've heard it) to go on the market and hope to wind up in my town? See how messy this'll get?
Neither of us wants to call Indy home; we are on the move and we know it. But the WAY in which we are on the move is not within our control, in many different ways. Bureaucratic and financial impacts can be substantial if we play this badly and long-distance-relating seems a virtual (not guaranteed) certainty.
A job interview is not a guarantee of an offer. There will be AT LEAST campus visits to do (January, February) and then perhaps phone followups and then perhaps an offer OR, as I've posted earlier, the universities might offer the job to a top candidate OR TWO before getting to me, and so if those people take other gigs, I might still get (or not get) job offers as late as May or even the mid-summer. Or I might get one from one college in March, but others in May. How long do I hold off? Do I take the first one? Do I press my potential employers for faster deadlines, once I get a first offer, IF I GET ONE AT ALL? See how random this is?
Not to mention ANYTHING about possibly not fitting with the institution the first year, and hopping RIGHT BACK into the job market and doing this all over again. Emotional considerations; financial considerations; life quality considerations; bureaucracy considerations.
So why is my practice tiring, why is my breathing uneven, why is my foot misbehaving? Hmm, I wonder if stress could have anything to do with it.
I moved to Bloomington, Indiana, in August 1994, looking for hippie-types and failing to find them, and I spent most of the first semester in a pitcher of Long Island Ice Tea and somehow managed to pull A's in grad school while doing it. I got into what looked like a fun little relationship in January 1995 and stayed in it years and years too long, until December 2002. Until, actually, THIS WEEK in December 2002.
Then I had a very adventurous 2003 and met the woman I now live with in August, and then moved to Indy in July 2005 (one year of Ashtanga practice down). And I've lived up here since then, but it's been Indiana for THIRTEEN YEARS. The idea of moving--the virtual certainty, in fact, of it--is a real world-shaker. The gaining of my first mature job, my first living wage, EVER. Yes folks, that's right, if you spend a decade in graduate school, you might not make your first living wage until you're THIRTY EIGHT. Count'em!
So why don't I want to challenge myself in an asana practice? Probably because I can use all the chill, seated meditation I can frickin GET.
There are silly bureaucratic things I should do pre-conference, like have the scraggly bits of my hair cut (I've had my hair cut FOUR times in the last FIVE years). Also, I should probably pick up a suit that fits me: I have four of the things, at least, but they're from years ago before I was something like 5'11/150, and now none of them fit right. It's worth, still, pulling'em all out and havin' a look. Maybe there's a miracle in there.
Why, again, did I not just become a monastic at the age of 6?
But I doubt that it's some kind of sly nerve damage. Yet I wonder, wait a minute, I haven't had this regularly since I was EIGHTEEN, and that's real close to TWENTY YEARS AGO. So what gives? Performance anxiety revisited? The coming conference, the coming interviews? Is that possible? Well, let's see what this conference potentially is:
December 27-30, Chicago. Thousands of liberal arts graduate students, faculty and others. A massive, MASSIVE number of schools will interview candidates here. As of today, I will be interviewed three times (and likely more will be requested between now and then). These will be for tenure-track gigs (so far), which means, positions that are, perhaps, permanent. None of them are any closer than about 4 hours from here by car, and some are several days drive from here. A word about my current mode of living:
My partner and I live in a house here in Indy. We are both East Coast kids, both PhD's, both lefties, both veggies, both arty hippie types, both West Coast kids by soul's intention (she is at home in Seattle; I, as you probably know a thousand times by now, at a city more south than that, by a famous Bay named after it).
What are we to do when (knock knock on the wood) I get employed somewhere, say, 6 hours drive from here, or 4 hours by plane from here, or elseway far, far away? She is in a tenure-track gig, I am in a one-year visiting gig (and it runs out in May 2008). Do we do long distance for a year and then SEE about me re-jumping into the job market, or both of us doing it? Or does she leave the fourth or fifth year of a tenure-track gig (it takes six years before you get tenure, BUT if you don't get it, you basically leave the Academy, as I've heard it) to go on the market and hope to wind up in my town? See how messy this'll get?
Neither of us wants to call Indy home; we are on the move and we know it. But the WAY in which we are on the move is not within our control, in many different ways. Bureaucratic and financial impacts can be substantial if we play this badly and long-distance-relating seems a virtual (not guaranteed) certainty.
A job interview is not a guarantee of an offer. There will be AT LEAST campus visits to do (January, February) and then perhaps phone followups and then perhaps an offer OR, as I've posted earlier, the universities might offer the job to a top candidate OR TWO before getting to me, and so if those people take other gigs, I might still get (or not get) job offers as late as May or even the mid-summer. Or I might get one from one college in March, but others in May. How long do I hold off? Do I take the first one? Do I press my potential employers for faster deadlines, once I get a first offer, IF I GET ONE AT ALL? See how random this is?
Not to mention ANYTHING about possibly not fitting with the institution the first year, and hopping RIGHT BACK into the job market and doing this all over again. Emotional considerations; financial considerations; life quality considerations; bureaucracy considerations.
So why is my practice tiring, why is my breathing uneven, why is my foot misbehaving? Hmm, I wonder if stress could have anything to do with it.
I moved to Bloomington, Indiana, in August 1994, looking for hippie-types and failing to find them, and I spent most of the first semester in a pitcher of Long Island Ice Tea and somehow managed to pull A's in grad school while doing it. I got into what looked like a fun little relationship in January 1995 and stayed in it years and years too long, until December 2002. Until, actually, THIS WEEK in December 2002.
Then I had a very adventurous 2003 and met the woman I now live with in August, and then moved to Indy in July 2005 (one year of Ashtanga practice down). And I've lived up here since then, but it's been Indiana for THIRTEEN YEARS. The idea of moving--the virtual certainty, in fact, of it--is a real world-shaker. The gaining of my first mature job, my first living wage, EVER. Yes folks, that's right, if you spend a decade in graduate school, you might not make your first living wage until you're THIRTY EIGHT. Count'em!
So why don't I want to challenge myself in an asana practice? Probably because I can use all the chill, seated meditation I can frickin GET.
There are silly bureaucratic things I should do pre-conference, like have the scraggly bits of my hair cut (I've had my hair cut FOUR times in the last FIVE years). Also, I should probably pick up a suit that fits me: I have four of the things, at least, but they're from years ago before I was something like 5'11/150, and now none of them fit right. It's worth, still, pulling'em all out and havin' a look. Maybe there's a miracle in there.
Why, again, did I not just become a monastic at the age of 6?
Sunday, December 9, 2007
Authorized/Certified Maybe-Meme
Curiosity as to who answers and how:
1) Have you ever, at any time, studied with an authorized/certified/otherwise senior Ashtanga teacher (note: David Swenson, while holding no "title," certainly counts here, that's why the "other" category)?
Yep.
2) How long has it been since you were in a room with said teacher?
Between six and seven months.
3) What was the last pose, if any, that an auth/cert teacher GAVE to you?
Never been given one.
4) What was the last pose you were doing, under said teacher's guidance?
Dropback/standups (with assistance).
5) Have you ever, or are you now, giving yourself poses?
I have to, yes, and I gave myself up to Kapotasana.
6) Do you buy the whole idea of "the teacher in charge gives poses one at a time"?
I suppose I do, yes, I just don't have enough exposure to say for sure.
7) If it's been a while since you've been around such a teacher, where do you EXPECT that you'll be stopped the next time you're in a Mysore-style room?
Right now? If I am still developing dropbacks, then there. If not, Kapo.
8) What's your non-Mysore-style practice like, if you have one?
As far as upper limits? I have done all of Intermediate, with modifications for the most intense backbend (Kapo), most intense leg-behind-head work (Dwi Pada) and most intense core work (Karandavasana). Often, my non-Mysore practice these days is sun salutations only, or partial Primary, or standing poses only. I also show up now and then in vinyasa classes.
9) If you had to choose between a strictly run Mysore-style room, and home practice (with more flexible limits), and you could ONLY choose ONE, what would you do?
I'd choose the Mysore-style room hands down. Maybe I'd think twice in warm weather, but in an Indiana winter, I would give ANYTHING for a regular practice shala. Plus, I was getting better backbend development there than I am here.
10) Are you a yoga criminal?
Nah, but I was taught by maybe the greatest Yoga Criminal on the West Coast.
11) How far, if ever, from your "final pose" have you wandered?
You mean how crim a pose have I ever tried? Well, Parsva Bakasana is in the 4th series, and I've done that. Side split is toward the end of 4th, and I've tried that. I've taken a shot now and then at Yogadandasana (put the same-side foot in your armpit), and that's also in the 4th series. Apparently, the 4th series. After all, virasana (hero pose) and the supta version are also in 4th series, and I've been able to do those for over a year, but I didn't know they were crim at the time. This is a hard question; after all, it's not like I do these poses WHILE I'm practicing, unless I'm doing a non-strict Ashtanga or a vinyasa practice.
12) What makes it (im)possible for you to find an authorized/certified/senior teacher?
Right now I'm nowhere near one--3 hour drive in any direction. What made it possible before was that the city I was in, was full of the darn things. FULL, I say.
1) Have you ever, at any time, studied with an authorized/certified/otherwise senior Ashtanga teacher (note: David Swenson, while holding no "title," certainly counts here, that's why the "other" category)?
Yep.
2) How long has it been since you were in a room with said teacher?
Between six and seven months.
3) What was the last pose, if any, that an auth/cert teacher GAVE to you?
Never been given one.
4) What was the last pose you were doing, under said teacher's guidance?
Dropback/standups (with assistance).
5) Have you ever, or are you now, giving yourself poses?
I have to, yes, and I gave myself up to Kapotasana.
6) Do you buy the whole idea of "the teacher in charge gives poses one at a time"?
I suppose I do, yes, I just don't have enough exposure to say for sure.
7) If it's been a while since you've been around such a teacher, where do you EXPECT that you'll be stopped the next time you're in a Mysore-style room?
Right now? If I am still developing dropbacks, then there. If not, Kapo.
8) What's your non-Mysore-style practice like, if you have one?
As far as upper limits? I have done all of Intermediate, with modifications for the most intense backbend (Kapo), most intense leg-behind-head work (Dwi Pada) and most intense core work (Karandavasana). Often, my non-Mysore practice these days is sun salutations only, or partial Primary, or standing poses only. I also show up now and then in vinyasa classes.
9) If you had to choose between a strictly run Mysore-style room, and home practice (with more flexible limits), and you could ONLY choose ONE, what would you do?
I'd choose the Mysore-style room hands down. Maybe I'd think twice in warm weather, but in an Indiana winter, I would give ANYTHING for a regular practice shala. Plus, I was getting better backbend development there than I am here.
10) Are you a yoga criminal?
Nah, but I was taught by maybe the greatest Yoga Criminal on the West Coast.
11) How far, if ever, from your "final pose" have you wandered?
You mean how crim a pose have I ever tried? Well, Parsva Bakasana is in the 4th series, and I've done that. Side split is toward the end of 4th, and I've tried that. I've taken a shot now and then at Yogadandasana (put the same-side foot in your armpit), and that's also in the 4th series. Apparently, the 4th series. After all, virasana (hero pose) and the supta version are also in 4th series, and I've been able to do those for over a year, but I didn't know they were crim at the time. This is a hard question; after all, it's not like I do these poses WHILE I'm practicing, unless I'm doing a non-strict Ashtanga or a vinyasa practice.
12) What makes it (im)possible for you to find an authorized/certified/senior teacher?
Right now I'm nowhere near one--3 hour drive in any direction. What made it possible before was that the city I was in, was full of the darn things. FULL, I say.
Morning rituals
There's something of a meme (maybe) going around, about morning yoga rituals. Here's my two cents:
Currently:
I rarely practice first thing in the morning these days. When I wake up, most of what's in my head is "need to mail that thing, write those, and prep that class, oh and don't forget the QXPZ, whatever it is." I have better practices when I get some of the school-life-money panic pinned down first. Ease panic first, stretch second.
A year ago in this house:
I was underway on my "practice before 8:30 am job" routine. I would get up at 5:30, creep out of bed, light a candle, unroll the mat, turn the house heat up from 59 to a ritzy 64, and then see if I practiced or not. Eventually I took to making a round of espresso before practicing. Some mornings I would just sit on the mat, with the cat, and chill. But many many times, I practiced, and often full Primary. That was when I finally started to be able to do Garbha Pindasana (lotus, hands through, put 'em on your head) regularly.
San Francisco:
Latest April and most of May, 2007. The room I rented was to serve totally as a den for the yoga bum. Clothing piled on floor, mat hung over the shelf in the closet (so it dried out), Mysore rug hung over the door (so it dried out). Wake up at 5:30, put clothing on body, bind ponytail, grab a handful of raw almonds (from Whole Foods; this was my morning snack for the whole month), sling mat and rug over shoulder with climbing sling and carabinier, exit apartment, walk from the Haight down to the Mission. Some mornings I would stop at a Starbucks' in the Castro and get a double espresso. Some mornings, at Divisadero, I would go UP to the other place instead of down to the Mission. No formal breakfast til after practice. Sure, some mornings I slept in, but not many.
Currently:
I rarely practice first thing in the morning these days. When I wake up, most of what's in my head is "need to mail that thing, write those, and prep that class, oh and don't forget the QXPZ, whatever it is." I have better practices when I get some of the school-life-money panic pinned down first. Ease panic first, stretch second.
A year ago in this house:
I was underway on my "practice before 8:30 am job" routine. I would get up at 5:30, creep out of bed, light a candle, unroll the mat, turn the house heat up from 59 to a ritzy 64, and then see if I practiced or not. Eventually I took to making a round of espresso before practicing. Some mornings I would just sit on the mat, with the cat, and chill. But many many times, I practiced, and often full Primary. That was when I finally started to be able to do Garbha Pindasana (lotus, hands through, put 'em on your head) regularly.
San Francisco:
Latest April and most of May, 2007. The room I rented was to serve totally as a den for the yoga bum. Clothing piled on floor, mat hung over the shelf in the closet (so it dried out), Mysore rug hung over the door (so it dried out). Wake up at 5:30, put clothing on body, bind ponytail, grab a handful of raw almonds (from Whole Foods; this was my morning snack for the whole month), sling mat and rug over shoulder with climbing sling and carabinier, exit apartment, walk from the Haight down to the Mission. Some mornings I would stop at a Starbucks' in the Castro and get a double espresso. Some mornings, at Divisadero, I would go UP to the other place instead of down to the Mission. No formal breakfast til after practice. Sure, some mornings I slept in, but not many.
Thursday, December 6, 2007
Blah, I say!
Today sees me with either the start of a cold or the physical effects of long accumulated stress. Post-nasal drip is my kryptonite.
I have grading, patient waiting on interview offers (or not), and eventually, three more job applications to send out (but to sexy, sexy places).
I find myself craving San Francisco. Not that I'd live in the same apartment (that'd be virtually impossible, or at least unlikely), but Yoga Shala is real close to Buena Vista Park, and of course that new Mysore-style outfit opened four blocks--FOUR!--from my old apartment on Page Street.
It is cold (let me here distribute some real live laughter to yoga blogs which mention "hardly breaking a sweat with the house heat up to 75"--try FIFTY NINE, you heatmongering so-and-so's....), it is getting sparsely populated as classes come to an end, my throat feels like a dirt road, and I pick up another load of loan payments on the 25 December, and then a third batch in March.
In three weeks I drive to Chicago for a professional conference, complete with suit and conference presentation of a paper I keep promising myself I'll polish.
Must remember that the "yoga bohemian" of May still lives. That, and that I have officially SURVIVED the fall semester. Loan payment made, electronically, yesterday. That means I have, cash-wise, actually lived through the first four terrifying months of "mature finances," where I pay 87 percent of my income on past debt.
Four more months of terror to go, and then the summer, and sometime in all of that (page, fetch me some wood to knock on!) a job offer, or more than one, will come through, and I will land safely on the far ledge of this canyon. Fie, gravity! Hold off for six, for seven more months!
I have grading, patient waiting on interview offers (or not), and eventually, three more job applications to send out (but to sexy, sexy places).
I find myself craving San Francisco. Not that I'd live in the same apartment (that'd be virtually impossible, or at least unlikely), but Yoga Shala is real close to Buena Vista Park, and of course that new Mysore-style outfit opened four blocks--FOUR!--from my old apartment on Page Street.
It is cold (let me here distribute some real live laughter to yoga blogs which mention "hardly breaking a sweat with the house heat up to 75"--try FIFTY NINE, you heatmongering so-and-so's....), it is getting sparsely populated as classes come to an end, my throat feels like a dirt road, and I pick up another load of loan payments on the 25 December, and then a third batch in March.
In three weeks I drive to Chicago for a professional conference, complete with suit and conference presentation of a paper I keep promising myself I'll polish.
Must remember that the "yoga bohemian" of May still lives. That, and that I have officially SURVIVED the fall semester. Loan payment made, electronically, yesterday. That means I have, cash-wise, actually lived through the first four terrifying months of "mature finances," where I pay 87 percent of my income on past debt.
Four more months of terror to go, and then the summer, and sometime in all of that (page, fetch me some wood to knock on!) a job offer, or more than one, will come through, and I will land safely on the far ledge of this canyon. Fie, gravity! Hold off for six, for seven more months!
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
Thoughts on some non-yoga things.
Inspired by the recent events over here, I present a set of thoughts on things not often discussed here in my wanna-be-yoga blog:
1. Fundamentalism, poverty and red states: this is a red state. But it is not the so-called "rabid" fundamentalist "yay Bush" type of red state. I wonder sometimes if there is ANY such state, or if it's all just neocon spin. Indiana, as far as I can tell, is a red state, because it really can't consciously will itself, as a mass-social entity, to be anything else. Recently the state overturned three Republican offices, but that was, as I heard it, largely due to the unpopular war (this state has something like the third largest military membership in the US). Also, Indianapolis just elected a Republican ex-Marine mayor, and his platform was basically, "Had enough?" and ambiguous talk about fiscal conservatism. It'll be interesting if he turns out to be a fiscal conservative; I thought the last of those died out in the 1980s. So it's not "fundamental central" here at all; it is a highly religious state and there is some (particularly anti-abortion) wingnuttery, but it's not what you might call "neocon" conservative. It's more "lazy" conservative. It's easy to preach family here or God or to put a license plate on your car that reads "In God We Trust," with a flag on the background. It's very difficult, on the other hand, to get people to ACTUALIZE social change or progressive values; for example, there's no regular exhaust or other car standard testing here. You can drive ANYTHING here; it doesn't matter what color the plumes of smoke coming out of your car are, or if the whole thing is held together with bungee binding or if the trunk is a plank of plywood or if the windows are currently plastic bags taped with duct tape. Indiana is a red state because of INERTIA.
2. Family and identity. Who are you, around your family? Are you the same person that you are, around your partner, or your yoga shala (if you have one)? I don't mean on the very, very surface; I mean at a fairly deep level, one from where you would be willing to say, "I." Here's my two cents: I went to college about two hours away from my parents' house, and did a lot of self-discovery stuff that I didn't talk about (no questions, no answers, no volunteering of any information, sort of a don't-ask-don't-tell policy). In 1994 I moved to Indiana (at the age of 24) and stayed here, so far, going on 13 years. In that time I got married and divorced, and that's also got kind of a don't-ask-don't-tell thing with my parents and family; I was raised by what you might call "lazy lay Catholics," who are also known as "Easter-Christmas Catholics," and anything body-sexuality-deviance is TOTALLY not up for discussion. Euphemism and discomfort central. Well, try being an adolescent at around the same time AIDS becomes a non-spoken-of threat, in 1983, in Reagan's America. See the friction? That's probably why any mention of "abstinence education" (which not coincidentally is promoted by social conservatives) turns my rant-o-meter up to about a 13 on a 1-10 scale. ANYWAY, I've been noticing for a while that when I visit home, my "self" there seems to be frozen at about age 20, which is, not coincidentally, the last time that my honest self-presentation and my actual experience did anything close to coincide, at least where my presentation-of-self-to-family is concerned.
It's not really deception, or, if it is, it is also equal parts SELF deception. I wish, in a way, that during that crazy wrong relationship, I had confided in my parents/family so that they could have seen a "me" that I didn't present otherwise. But I didn't, I put up a mask for everyone, and then after the divorce, I abandoned even that and went on a total revolution of honesty, and now "who I was," which was then and is now nothing more than a spectacle or a face on a sarcophagus, etched in gold and blue, is too far, so far, from "who I am." How can it ever be reconciled? How much of that history, which for me was imaginary, but for everyone who believed it, real, can be remade? Is that even necessary?
So there is both a gulf of silence, which I obeyed but didn't set in place, as well as a gulf of deception, which I did put in place, but as a way of defending, a way of eeking out an existence during deep oppression which I didn't realize, at the time, that I'd also chosen. Ignorance of that order must be stopped. And now it has been.
So when I said, "I'm going to learn to teach yoga" and had to explain it a couple times to get it to make sense, what kind of sense could it have made?
Is this standing silence that I don't know how to cross, going to come and bite me in the butt sometime, the way that film noir heroes are bitten by the past? Or is it fine, despite the fact that it'd probably make a decent Parker Posey movie?
This is part of the reason I don't wander off from yoga too often here. But maybe it's fine, maybe you prefer it this way.
1. Fundamentalism, poverty and red states: this is a red state. But it is not the so-called "rabid" fundamentalist "yay Bush" type of red state. I wonder sometimes if there is ANY such state, or if it's all just neocon spin. Indiana, as far as I can tell, is a red state, because it really can't consciously will itself, as a mass-social entity, to be anything else. Recently the state overturned three Republican offices, but that was, as I heard it, largely due to the unpopular war (this state has something like the third largest military membership in the US). Also, Indianapolis just elected a Republican ex-Marine mayor, and his platform was basically, "Had enough?" and ambiguous talk about fiscal conservatism. It'll be interesting if he turns out to be a fiscal conservative; I thought the last of those died out in the 1980s. So it's not "fundamental central" here at all; it is a highly religious state and there is some (particularly anti-abortion) wingnuttery, but it's not what you might call "neocon" conservative. It's more "lazy" conservative. It's easy to preach family here or God or to put a license plate on your car that reads "In God We Trust," with a flag on the background. It's very difficult, on the other hand, to get people to ACTUALIZE social change or progressive values; for example, there's no regular exhaust or other car standard testing here. You can drive ANYTHING here; it doesn't matter what color the plumes of smoke coming out of your car are, or if the whole thing is held together with bungee binding or if the trunk is a plank of plywood or if the windows are currently plastic bags taped with duct tape. Indiana is a red state because of INERTIA.
2. Family and identity. Who are you, around your family? Are you the same person that you are, around your partner, or your yoga shala (if you have one)? I don't mean on the very, very surface; I mean at a fairly deep level, one from where you would be willing to say, "I." Here's my two cents: I went to college about two hours away from my parents' house, and did a lot of self-discovery stuff that I didn't talk about (no questions, no answers, no volunteering of any information, sort of a don't-ask-don't-tell policy). In 1994 I moved to Indiana (at the age of 24) and stayed here, so far, going on 13 years. In that time I got married and divorced, and that's also got kind of a don't-ask-don't-tell thing with my parents and family; I was raised by what you might call "lazy lay Catholics," who are also known as "Easter-Christmas Catholics," and anything body-sexuality-deviance is TOTALLY not up for discussion. Euphemism and discomfort central. Well, try being an adolescent at around the same time AIDS becomes a non-spoken-of threat, in 1983, in Reagan's America. See the friction? That's probably why any mention of "abstinence education" (which not coincidentally is promoted by social conservatives) turns my rant-o-meter up to about a 13 on a 1-10 scale. ANYWAY, I've been noticing for a while that when I visit home, my "self" there seems to be frozen at about age 20, which is, not coincidentally, the last time that my honest self-presentation and my actual experience did anything close to coincide, at least where my presentation-of-self-to-family is concerned.
It's not really deception, or, if it is, it is also equal parts SELF deception. I wish, in a way, that during that crazy wrong relationship, I had confided in my parents/family so that they could have seen a "me" that I didn't present otherwise. But I didn't, I put up a mask for everyone, and then after the divorce, I abandoned even that and went on a total revolution of honesty, and now "who I was," which was then and is now nothing more than a spectacle or a face on a sarcophagus, etched in gold and blue, is too far, so far, from "who I am." How can it ever be reconciled? How much of that history, which for me was imaginary, but for everyone who believed it, real, can be remade? Is that even necessary?
So there is both a gulf of silence, which I obeyed but didn't set in place, as well as a gulf of deception, which I did put in place, but as a way of defending, a way of eeking out an existence during deep oppression which I didn't realize, at the time, that I'd also chosen. Ignorance of that order must be stopped. And now it has been.
So when I said, "I'm going to learn to teach yoga" and had to explain it a couple times to get it to make sense, what kind of sense could it have made?
Is this standing silence that I don't know how to cross, going to come and bite me in the butt sometime, the way that film noir heroes are bitten by the past? Or is it fine, despite the fact that it'd probably make a decent Parker Posey movie?
This is part of the reason I don't wander off from yoga too often here. But maybe it's fine, maybe you prefer it this way.
Monday, December 3, 2007
Lesson: your practice knows more than you do.
Practices are hilarious things.
Yesterday I had my once-every-two-months hip breakdown, which is fine. And it put my guard up for tonight's Intro to Intermediate. 3 students, including me, so small and mellow.
Easy sun salutations, deep forward bends, I took the foot, not the toe, in Trikonasana, took an extra breath before folding, to stretch the psoas/quad in Parivrtta Trik, put palms together instead of on the floor in Parivrtta Parsvakonasana.
Backed off the hamstring stretch in Parsvottanasana, nailed the balance in Utthita Hasta (that's a good sign), did up to Virabhadrasana B before Pasasana.
Standard Pasasana (bound, feet flat, going right; bound, on toes, going left). Big Shalabhasana, one leg at a time Bhekasana (in order to emphasize front body opening; sure I can do both feet at once, but I was on guard tonight).
Big Dhanurasana, 10 breaths in right-side-to-floor Parsva Dhanurasana. Noticeably deeper Updogs after. Friendly Ustrasana, full expression of Laghuvajrasana, and three, count them THREE, hands-in movements in Kapo, but STILL no hands to feet. Lots, and I mean a LOT, of sensation, in the lower thoracic spine. Also a tweaking in the right deltoid, so that was enough of that.
Happy Bakasanas, both of them. Great, really really deep and fun, twists. Big, big hip action in Ardha Matsyendrasana. 3 1/2 breaths in Eka Pada Sirsasana C (the press up with leg behind head) on the right side, before it slipped. A quick moment of Chakorasana on the left side (rawk!).
And then to backbends: 9 wheels, every one of them one of the best ever. This, after a total hip breakdown yesterday. Unexpected, but welcome. Unpredictable.
The lesson: practice knows more than you do. It's not even "surrender your ego," it's "dude, the ego just doesn't know the story." It's like some David Lynch film, where your ego has to undo the whole hour of movie watching that it has done, so that it can figure out who the blond women are (yes, film geeking; I've earned it).
A nice, fluid, flexible closing series. Shins to floor in Karnapidasana. Big thoracic bend in Mathsyasana. Easy chakrasana. Easy Baddha Padmasana. 25 ujjayi breaths in Uth Pluthi. Final vinyasa and chilling to a heater with an oscillating fan, which totally SENT me.
Some days I love Intermediate, and want to do it all week long until Friday.
I'm sorely tempted.
Yesterday I had my once-every-two-months hip breakdown, which is fine. And it put my guard up for tonight's Intro to Intermediate. 3 students, including me, so small and mellow.
Easy sun salutations, deep forward bends, I took the foot, not the toe, in Trikonasana, took an extra breath before folding, to stretch the psoas/quad in Parivrtta Trik, put palms together instead of on the floor in Parivrtta Parsvakonasana.
Backed off the hamstring stretch in Parsvottanasana, nailed the balance in Utthita Hasta (that's a good sign), did up to Virabhadrasana B before Pasasana.
Standard Pasasana (bound, feet flat, going right; bound, on toes, going left). Big Shalabhasana, one leg at a time Bhekasana (in order to emphasize front body opening; sure I can do both feet at once, but I was on guard tonight).
Big Dhanurasana, 10 breaths in right-side-to-floor Parsva Dhanurasana. Noticeably deeper Updogs after. Friendly Ustrasana, full expression of Laghuvajrasana, and three, count them THREE, hands-in movements in Kapo, but STILL no hands to feet. Lots, and I mean a LOT, of sensation, in the lower thoracic spine. Also a tweaking in the right deltoid, so that was enough of that.
Happy Bakasanas, both of them. Great, really really deep and fun, twists. Big, big hip action in Ardha Matsyendrasana. 3 1/2 breaths in Eka Pada Sirsasana C (the press up with leg behind head) on the right side, before it slipped. A quick moment of Chakorasana on the left side (rawk!).
And then to backbends: 9 wheels, every one of them one of the best ever. This, after a total hip breakdown yesterday. Unexpected, but welcome. Unpredictable.
The lesson: practice knows more than you do. It's not even "surrender your ego," it's "dude, the ego just doesn't know the story." It's like some David Lynch film, where your ego has to undo the whole hour of movie watching that it has done, so that it can figure out who the blond women are (yes, film geeking; I've earned it).
A nice, fluid, flexible closing series. Shins to floor in Karnapidasana. Big thoracic bend in Mathsyasana. Easy chakrasana. Easy Baddha Padmasana. 25 ujjayi breaths in Uth Pluthi. Final vinyasa and chilling to a heater with an oscillating fan, which totally SENT me.
Some days I love Intermediate, and want to do it all week long until Friday.
I'm sorely tempted.
What the, uh... (asana question)
What would you do if you were having fairly consistent, fairly intense unbalance in the hips? Let me be more specific:
The right hip has always been more tight (in virtually any direction or movement) than the left one. Everyone has, to some degree, a "tight" and a "loose" hip, at least in all the practitioners I've been, taught or seen.
Pardon the anatomy-ese coming up, but that's how one gets precise:
Specifically, and in particular during yesterday's practice, I will sometimes get pain and what I can only describe as a "pumped out" feeling, in the right hip, from the iliac crest down to the greater trochanter, and in a "ring" around the lateral hip, involving maybe the top of the rectus femoris, across the gluteus medius and into the tensor fasciae latae, and then into the gluteus maximus.
Symptoms? A desperate aching for poses like Dhanurasana (Bow), Parsva Dhanurasana (Side Bow; same pose, but on your side), and standing dropbacks, anything that will pull open the abs and the psoas, and release the glutes. Also, a like craving for twists, specifically Ardha Matsyendrasana (Half lord of the Fishes). Pasasana (Noose) becomes impossible when this hip business acts up.
Further symptoms? Cramping, if I persist, in movements that involve deep flexion of the thigh (like the final "float" in Utthita Hasta Padangusthasana (Hand to Big Toe). Inability, eventually, to hold a pose like Navasana (Boat). Aching throughout the lateral right hip and the lower back (psoas muscle, anyone?).
Solutions:
1) When this happens during practice, chill.
2) Do I want to do more Intermediate and less Primary?
3) Or maybe just a ton of lunges, outside of practice?
4) Nothing feels better, on this, than Parsva Dhanurasana. That pose hits JUST the right magic spot (done with right side to floor).
5) More backbends: but what can I do to warm up for them?
6) I keep my stress in my lateral hips: stress reduction. NOW? Surely you know what my stress levels have been like recently...
Note for the record: this happens only and ever on the right side. Never so much as a trace of it on the left.
Poses: deep hip movements are possible on the right leg. Half lotus? No worries. Sure, I can't always bind Marichyasana D EVERY time, but most of the time, can do. Leg behind head? Can do. Baddha Konasana? Head to feet, often. Utthita Hasta? Swing to side, float in front, all good. I do notice that my Ardha Matsyendrasana is a bigger, more intense stretch on the right side (that is, with the right knee UP). Also, my Parivrtta Parsvakonasana is more limited when I twist to the right.
Pigeon poses (not Kapotasana, but the non-Ashtanga "pigeon lunges" you see people do) are informative; right foot likes, when it's in front, to be closer to my body than left foot does.
And Hanumanasana (front splits): when the right leg is BACK, the stretch in the front thigh is MILES more intense than with left leg back. This also goes for big, deep lunges of any kind.
Ok, ok, ok, I probably know more about this than you do. But still, your two cents are welcome and invited.
Cheers!
The right hip has always been more tight (in virtually any direction or movement) than the left one. Everyone has, to some degree, a "tight" and a "loose" hip, at least in all the practitioners I've been, taught or seen.
Pardon the anatomy-ese coming up, but that's how one gets precise:
Specifically, and in particular during yesterday's practice, I will sometimes get pain and what I can only describe as a "pumped out" feeling, in the right hip, from the iliac crest down to the greater trochanter, and in a "ring" around the lateral hip, involving maybe the top of the rectus femoris, across the gluteus medius and into the tensor fasciae latae, and then into the gluteus maximus.
Symptoms? A desperate aching for poses like Dhanurasana (Bow), Parsva Dhanurasana (Side Bow; same pose, but on your side), and standing dropbacks, anything that will pull open the abs and the psoas, and release the glutes. Also, a like craving for twists, specifically Ardha Matsyendrasana (Half lord of the Fishes). Pasasana (Noose) becomes impossible when this hip business acts up.
Further symptoms? Cramping, if I persist, in movements that involve deep flexion of the thigh (like the final "float" in Utthita Hasta Padangusthasana (Hand to Big Toe). Inability, eventually, to hold a pose like Navasana (Boat). Aching throughout the lateral right hip and the lower back (psoas muscle, anyone?).
Solutions:
1) When this happens during practice, chill.
2) Do I want to do more Intermediate and less Primary?
3) Or maybe just a ton of lunges, outside of practice?
4) Nothing feels better, on this, than Parsva Dhanurasana. That pose hits JUST the right magic spot (done with right side to floor).
5) More backbends: but what can I do to warm up for them?
6) I keep my stress in my lateral hips: stress reduction. NOW? Surely you know what my stress levels have been like recently...
Note for the record: this happens only and ever on the right side. Never so much as a trace of it on the left.
Poses: deep hip movements are possible on the right leg. Half lotus? No worries. Sure, I can't always bind Marichyasana D EVERY time, but most of the time, can do. Leg behind head? Can do. Baddha Konasana? Head to feet, often. Utthita Hasta? Swing to side, float in front, all good. I do notice that my Ardha Matsyendrasana is a bigger, more intense stretch on the right side (that is, with the right knee UP). Also, my Parivrtta Parsvakonasana is more limited when I twist to the right.
Pigeon poses (not Kapotasana, but the non-Ashtanga "pigeon lunges" you see people do) are informative; right foot likes, when it's in front, to be closer to my body than left foot does.
And Hanumanasana (front splits): when the right leg is BACK, the stretch in the front thigh is MILES more intense than with left leg back. This also goes for big, deep lunges of any kind.
Ok, ok, ok, I probably know more about this than you do. But still, your two cents are welcome and invited.
Cheers!
Saturday, December 1, 2007
So Much Yoga.
Hahaha, I got my wish.
Yesterday: Bloomington, an hour south of here. Primary and Intermediate up to the twists (that is, after the arm balance and before the leg-behind-head) in a gym, on gym mats, with young people all around, doing abdominal work (do they do no backbends??). A practice so nice and so delayed, so earned, that when I got to the climbing gym down there, ostensibly to set some routes, I wasn't interested (!!!).
8 backbends, the latter 3 the best of the bunch.
That is a SERIOUS first. I have NEVER been so mellow that I didn't want to set. But here's my theory: stress sometimes serves as strength. Tension serves as power. When the tension is released, and actual decompression ensues, mellowness appears almost as apathy. It's how exhausted people function, or caffeine addicts, or junkies of any stripe. I hit a few boulder problems, and did pull a few 5.11 and 5.12 moves on a few routes, but I didn't seriously climb nor did I set a thing. 5 more backbends to undo the front-body exertion.
Today: up at 7 am. Time to send off some job application stuff and get my job life in order, before heading 40 minutes west to teach Modified Primary. Class from 9:30 to 10:30. Dart to downtown to catch my teacher's 11:00 class; I got there at 11:10 but wasn't the latest one to arrive. GREAT class; Primary up to Baddha Konasana and then some cutting for time; 6 backbends, good ones. And then waiting for my Bandhas workshop, which began at 2 pm. 4 students, 2 Ashtanga regulars and 2 not, and I went through the verbal bit on bandhas, the muscular bit, and we did a longish session on sun salutations; it was like teacher training; very cool and fun. And then a vinyasa session, numerous bandha-builders, like that half-uttanasana (often called "spinal extension") in sun sals, and all of the wonderful "hands on hips" standing forward bends moves. Those are all about "check your bandhas" (at least as I read it). It was a good time; maybe I'll do a second one in the spring.
So that's almost 8 hours of yoga or driving to-fro yoga. I teach tomorrow, maybe I play student on Monday, I definitely play student on Tuesday, and then teach the class no one comes to on Wednesday, and then teach again on Thursday (which this past week saw 8 people; EIGHT! Un-frickin-HEARD-of!!).
And then it's finals and everyone leaves town or has family over or something else, and then it's 2008. I will be in Chicago from Dec 27-29 for what might be a hiring conference. Haha, Merry Christmas indeed.
Yesterday: Bloomington, an hour south of here. Primary and Intermediate up to the twists (that is, after the arm balance and before the leg-behind-head) in a gym, on gym mats, with young people all around, doing abdominal work (do they do no backbends??). A practice so nice and so delayed, so earned, that when I got to the climbing gym down there, ostensibly to set some routes, I wasn't interested (!!!).
8 backbends, the latter 3 the best of the bunch.
That is a SERIOUS first. I have NEVER been so mellow that I didn't want to set. But here's my theory: stress sometimes serves as strength. Tension serves as power. When the tension is released, and actual decompression ensues, mellowness appears almost as apathy. It's how exhausted people function, or caffeine addicts, or junkies of any stripe. I hit a few boulder problems, and did pull a few 5.11 and 5.12 moves on a few routes, but I didn't seriously climb nor did I set a thing. 5 more backbends to undo the front-body exertion.
Today: up at 7 am. Time to send off some job application stuff and get my job life in order, before heading 40 minutes west to teach Modified Primary. Class from 9:30 to 10:30. Dart to downtown to catch my teacher's 11:00 class; I got there at 11:10 but wasn't the latest one to arrive. GREAT class; Primary up to Baddha Konasana and then some cutting for time; 6 backbends, good ones. And then waiting for my Bandhas workshop, which began at 2 pm. 4 students, 2 Ashtanga regulars and 2 not, and I went through the verbal bit on bandhas, the muscular bit, and we did a longish session on sun salutations; it was like teacher training; very cool and fun. And then a vinyasa session, numerous bandha-builders, like that half-uttanasana (often called "spinal extension") in sun sals, and all of the wonderful "hands on hips" standing forward bends moves. Those are all about "check your bandhas" (at least as I read it). It was a good time; maybe I'll do a second one in the spring.
So that's almost 8 hours of yoga or driving to-fro yoga. I teach tomorrow, maybe I play student on Monday, I definitely play student on Tuesday, and then teach the class no one comes to on Wednesday, and then teach again on Thursday (which this past week saw 8 people; EIGHT! Un-frickin-HEARD-of!!).
And then it's finals and everyone leaves town or has family over or something else, and then it's 2008. I will be in Chicago from Dec 27-29 for what might be a hiring conference. Haha, Merry Christmas indeed.
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